i-t\a^  /3^  iM^ 


1 


CONNECTICUT 


Agricultural  Experiment  Station 


4-3 


NEW    HAVEN,    CONN. 


BULLETIN  194,  JULY,  1917. 


MANURE  FROM  THE  SEA. 


By  E.  H.  JENKINS  and  JOHN  PHILLIPS  STREET. 


Plate  I. — Irish  Moss  or  Carrageen  (Chondrus  crispus). 


The  Bulletins  of  this  Station  are  mailed  free  to  citizens  of  Con- 
necticut who  apply  for  them,  and  to  others  as  far  as  the  editions 
permit. 


CONNECTICUT  AGRICULTURAL  EXPERIMENT  STATION. 

OFFICERS  AND  STAFF. 


BOARD  OF  CONTROL. 

His  Excellency,  Marcus  H.  Holcomb,  ex-officio.  President. 

James  H.  Webb,  Vice  President Hamden 

George  A.  Hopson,  Secretary Wallingford 

E.  H.  Jenkins,  Director  and  Treasurer New  Haven 

Joseph   W.   Alsop Avon 

Wilson  H.  Lee  Orange 

Frank  H.   Stadtmueller Elmwood 


Administration.  E.  H.  Jenkins,  Ph.D.,  Director  and  Treasurer. 

Miss  V.  E.  Cole,  Librarian  and  Stenographer. 
Miss  L.  M.  Brautlecht,  Bookkeeper  and  Stenographer. 

William  Veitch,  In  charge  of  Buildings  and  Grounds. 

Chemistry. 
Analytical    Laboratory.  John  Phillips  Street,  M.S.,  Chemist  in  Charge. 
L.  Monroe  Bailey,  Ph.D.,  \ 

C.  B.  Morison,  B.S.,  C.  E.  Shepard,     ^Assistants. 
W.  L.  Adams,  B.S.  j 

Hugo  Lange,   Laboratory  Helper. 
V.  L.  Churchill,  Sampling  Agent. 


Proteid  Research. 


T.  B.  Osborne,  Ph.D.,  D.Sc,  Chemist  in  Charge. 
Miss  E.  L.  Ferry,  M.S.,  Assistant. 


Botany. 


Entomology. 


Forestry. 


Plant  Breeding. 


G.  P.  Clinton,   Sc.D.,  Botanist. 

E.  ]\r.  Stoddard,  B.S.,  Assistant  Botanist. 

Florence  A.   McCormick,   Ph.D.,   Scientific   Assistant. 

G.  E.  Graham,  General  Assistant. 

W.   E.   Britton,   Ph.D.,  Entomologist;    State  Entomologist. 

B.  H.  Walden,  B.Agr.,  First  Assistant. 

Q.  S.  Lowry,  B.Sc.  I.  W.  Davis,  B.Sc,  \  Assistants. 
M.  P.  Zappe,  B.S.,  ' 

Miss  G.  A.  Foote,  B.A.,  Stenographer. 

Walter  O.  Filley,  Forester;    also  State  Forester 

and   State  Forest  Fire    Warden. 
A.  E.  Moss,  M.F.,  Assistant  State  and  Station  Forester. 
Miss  E.   L.  Avery,  Stenographer. 

Donald  F.  Jones,   M.S.,  Plant  Breeder. 

C.  D.  HuBBELL,  Assistant. 


Vegetable   Growing. 


MANURE   FROM   THE   SEA 

E.  H.  Jenkins  and  John  Phillips  Street. 


Before  commercial  fertilizers  were  widely  used,  there  were 
fine  meadows  and  pastures  in  our  shore  towns,  and  abundant 
crops  were  grown.  These  were  produced  with  the  aid  of  farm 
manure,  chiefly  made  on  home-grown  feeds,  among  which  were 
the  finer  salt-marsh  grasses  (the  coarser  being  used  for  litter), 
and  also  by  the  use  of  manures  got  from  the  sea — seaweeds  and 
marine  mud.  Some  "old-fashioned  farmers"  are  to-day  using 
such  manures  with  success. 

At  this  time,  when  commercial  fertilizers  cost  more  than  ever, 
when  potash  salts  cannot  be  bought  at  any  price,  and  when  some 
of  the  materials  used  in  making  fertilizers,  like  nitrates  and 
sulphuric  acid,  are  needed  for  munitions,  it  is  worth  while  to 
inquire  whether  those  having  shore  farms  cannot  return  in  some 
measure  to  the  ways  of  our  forefathers  and  in  a  time  of  scarcity 
make  more  use  of  what  our  predecessors  used. 

It  is  partly  a  question  in  economics.  With  the  present  scale 
of  prices,  will  it  pay  better  to  handle  and  use  low-grade  manures, 
which  cost  little  but  require  much  labor,  than  to  pay  war  prices 
for  fertilizers  which  cost  much  money  but  require  relatively 
httle  labor  ? 

It  is  also  partly  a  question  of  soil  sanitation.  We  have  been 
using  relatively  much  concentrated  plant  food  and  less  and  less 
humus-forming  vegetable  matter.  We  know  more  than  we  once 
did  of  the  value  of  these  humus-forming  materials  in  amending 
soils,  especially  our  light  sandy  soils,  and  in  increasing  the  soluble 
plant  food  in  them.  May  not  a  partial  change  for  a  time  in  our 
system  of  fertilizing  be  an  advantage?  This  change  will  consist 
in  an  added  emphasis  on  the  use  of  quickly  decaying  vegetable 
matters  with  lime.  We  believe  that  many  fields  will  respond 
profitably  to  such  a  change.  We  do  not,  of  course,  advocate 
the  entire  abandonment  of  commercial  fertilizers,  but  rather, 
as  a  war  measure,  urge  every  effort  to  prepare,  preserve  and 
use  every  kind  of  vegetable  manure,  supplementing  it,  particu- 
larly on  the  short-lived  cash  crops,  with  commercial  fertilizers. 


4  CONNECTICUT    EXPERIMENT    STATION    BULLETIN    I94. 

This  bulletin  treats  of  the  value  of  seaweeds  and  of  marine 
mud.  Other  bulletins  may  follow,  regarding  the  preparation  and 
use  of  other  somewhat  neglected  resources  of  the  farm. 

What  Seaweeds  Contain. 
Table  I  gives  the  average  composition  of  such  seaweeds  as 
make  up  the  larger  part  of  this  material  on  the  New  England 


Plate  II. — Round-stalked  Rockweed  (Ascophylluui  nodosum). 


coast,  and  which  have  been  analyzed  at  the  Rhode  Island, 
Massachusetts  and  Connecticut  Stations. 

Plates  I  to  VI  show  the  general  appearance  of  the  weeds 
named  in  the  Table  and  in  this  bulletin. 

In  most  respects  the  different  species  are  fairly  alike  in  com- 
position. Irish  moss  (nine  analyses)  seems  to  contain  more 
potash  than  the  others.  Further  analyses  of  other  species  of 
which  only  one  analysis  was  made  will  be  needed  to  prove 
whether  they  consistently  contain  more  potash  than  the  average. 

The  larger  amount  of  lime  in  one  of  the  species  is  due  to 
adhering  shells. 


WHAT  SEAWEEDS  CONTAIN.  5 

All  analyses  have  been  calculated  to  75.0  per  cent  of  moisture, 
as  this  fairly  approximates  the  water-content  of  fresh  drained 
weeds. 

The  following  is  a  fair  statement  of  the  average  composition 
of  fresh  mixed  seaweeds  and  will  not  differ  widely  from  the 
average  of  any  one  of  them. 

For   comparison   are   given   the   average   composition   of   our 


Plate  III. — Flat-stalked  Rockweed  (Fucus  vesiculosus) . 

analyses  of  New  York  stable  manure  as  sold  in  this  state  and 
of  fresh  cow  manure  with  litter  (Thome's  compilation). 


Seaweeds 

Water    75.00% 

Organic   matter    17.64 

Mineral  matter    7.36 

100.00 

Nitrogen    0.49 

Phosphoric   acid    0.13 

Potash    0.69 

Lime    0.66 

Magnesia    0.34 


New  York 
iorse  Manure 

Cow  Manure 
with  Litter 

68.83% 

86.8% 

27.12 

4-OS 

100.00 

0.62 

0.46 

0.42 

0.41 

0.58 

0.43 

0.52 

0.24 

6  connecticut  experiment  station  bulletin  i94. 

Comparison  with  Animal  Manure 
From  the  above  it  appears  that  the  average  seaweed  contains 
less  organic  matter,  nitrogen  and  phosphoric  acid  than  New 
York  horse  manure,  and  compared  with  cow  manure  it  has 
about  the  same  amount  of  nitrogen,  much  less  phosphoric  acid 
and  more  potash.  Seaweeds  are  relatively  deficient  in  phosphoric 
acid. 


Plate  IV. — Laminaria  flexicaulis. 


Judging  from  the  chemical  analysis  alone,  it  might  be  expected 
that  seaweed  would  be  somewhat  inferior  to  horse  or  cow 
manure,  chiefly  because  of  the  smaller  amount  of  vegetable 
(humus-forming)  matter  in  it.  The  larger  amount  of  salt 
(from  2  to  5  per  cent)  in  seaweed  may  have  sometimes  a 
compensating  effect. 

Eel-grass  is  generally  regarded  as  inferior  to  the  rockweeds 
as  manure,  though  the  composition  of  the  fresh  material  is  not 
strikingly  different.  It  is  not  a  true  alga,  like  the  others,  but 
belongs  to  the  duckweed  family  and  is  usually  gathered  when 
dead  and  cast  up  by  storms,  while  rockweed  is  mostly  gathered 
while  growing  on  the  rocks.     As  long  as  seaweeds  are  alive, 


VALUE    AND    USE    OF    SEAWEED. 


their  constituents  are  not  dissolved  by  the  water  which  sur- 
rounds them,  but  when  dead  these  constituents  are  in  part 
leached  out  by  the  sea-water. 


Plate  V. — Ribbon  Weed,  Kelp,  Tangle  {Laminaria  saccharina). 

The  Value  and  Use  of  Seaweed. 

Its  value  as  manure  has  long  been  known.  On  the  coast  and 
neighboring  islands  of  Great  Britain  seaweed  has  long  been  prized 
as  a  manure.  In  Ireland,  where  it  is  extensively  used  on  potato 
land  instead  of  farmyard  manure,  it  is  often  carted  long  dis- 
tances. Tests  in  three  successive  years  by  the  Department  of 
Agriculture  indicate  that  weight  for  weight  it  seldom  yields  as 
heavy  a  crop  of  potatoes  as  does  farm  manure. 

Seaweed  gives  its  best  results  on  light  soils  and  possibly  in 
dry  seasons.     (Jour.  Dept.  Agr.  for  Ireland,  14,  p.  270.) 


8  CONNECTICUT    EXPERIMENT    STATION    BULLETIN    I94. 

On  the  light  soils  of  the  Scilly  Islands  as  much  as  50  tons  per 
acre  of  weed  are  used  on  early  potatoes. 

On  Thanet  10-15  tons  per  acre  are  used  as  a  fertilizer  for 
early  vegetables. 

In  a  suit  brought  in  England  to  determine  compensation  for 
deprivation  of  right  to  collect  seaweed  on  the  coast  for  fertiliz- 
ing purposes,  the  evidence  tended  to  show  that  seaweed  was 
fully  equal  if  not  superior  to  barnyard  manure. 


Plate  VI. — Dulse,  Dillusk  {Rhodymenia  palmata). 

The   following   quotations    from   Storer   refer   to   thesis? 
seaweeds  in  our  own  country: 

"Here  in  New  England  there  is  abundant  evidence  of  the  great 
value  of  sea  manure." 

"The  strip  of  country  behind  Rye  Beach,  in  New  Hampshire, 
comprising  the  towns  of  Rye,  Greenland,  and  Northampton, 
affords  a  striking  example." 

"Abundant  crops  of  hay,  and  (in  former  times  more  than  now) 
of  potatoes,  are  there  grown  and  sold  year  after  year,  while  the 
country  remains  fertile  and  fortunate." 


VALUE   AND    USE    OF    SEAWEED.  9 

The  unusual  excellence  of  pasturage  on  shore  farms  in  Guil- 
ford and  other  shore  towns  in  past  years  may  fairly  be  ascribed 
to  the  abundant  use  of  manures  taken  from  the  seashore. 

A  summary  of  testimony  in  its  favor  is  given  by  Wheeler  and 
Hartwell  in  an  excellent  bulletin  (No.  21)  of  the  Rhode  Island 
Station,  which  has  been  freely  used  in  this  article. 

Both  the  round-stalked  and  the  flat-stalked  rockweed  have 
been  much  used  on  our  shore  farms,  farmers  sometimes  paying 
five  cents  a  bushel  for  it  as  cut  from  the  rocks. 


Plate  VII. — Eel-grass,  Seaweed  (Zostera  marina). 


In  Rhode  Island  it  is  prized  and  is  sometimes  hauled  eight 
or  ten  miles  inland. 

With  the  present  scarcity  and  high  price  of  stable  manure, 
seaweed  has  become  more  valuable  and  should  be  more  exten- 
sively tested  and  used. 

On  corn  land  and  land  to  be  seeded  down  or  used  for  growing 
vegetables  it  has  yielded  excellent  results. 

Applied  to  potato  land  in  the  spring,  it  may  perhaps  injure 
the  quality  of  the  crop  because  of  the  salt  in  it,  but  if  used  the 
year  before  no  injury  need  be  feared  from  moderate  dressings. 

It  is  also  claimed  by  those  who  have  used  seaweed  extensively 


lO  CONNECTICUT    EXPERIMENT    STATION    BULLETIN    I94. 

that  it  "holds  moisture,"  that,  is,  that  lands  dressed  with  it  do 
not  suffer  from  drought  in  summer  so  severely  as  those  not  so 
treated. 

How  TO  USE  Seaweed. 

Eel-grass,  as  has  been  said,  is  of  inferior  value.  As  gathered, 
it  contains  less  plant  food  and  it  is  slow  to  decay.  Partly  dried, 
it  can  be  used  for  protection  from  frost,  and  in  the  pig-pen  it 
is  an  absorbent  and  adds  to  the  organic  matter  of  the  manure. 
It  does  not  pay  as  top-dressing  or  to  plow  under  unless  it  has 
been  well  rotted. 

Rockweed,  on  the  other  hand,  should  be  put  on  the  land  fresh, 
either  as  a  winter  top-dressing  for  grass  or  plowed  under  in 
spring  for  hoed  crops.  If  piled  by  itself  it  rots  to  a  slimy  mass 
and  loses  its  fertilizer  constituents.  If  it  cannot  be  used  as 
gathered,  it  might  be  piled  together  with  eel-grass  and  would 
help  to  rot  it  and  make  a  good  compost. 

Time  of  Gathering. 
The  work  of  Wheeler  and  Hartwell  indicates  that,  with  few 
exceptions,  seaweed  gathered  in  January  and  March  contains 
more  nitrogen,  phosphoric  acid  and  potash  than  the  same  varie- 
ties gathered  in  September.  Convenience  and  expense  of 
gathering  probably  more  than  offset  seasonal  differences  in 
composition. 

Extraction  of  Potash  from  Seaweed. 

Public  attention  has  been  frequently  called  to  certain  kelps 
found  on  the  Pacific  coast,  which  contain  relatively  large  quanti- 
ties of  potash.  So  far  as  known,  however,  none  of  the  marine 
growths  on  the  Atlantic  coast  contains  any  large  arnount  of  that 
element. 

On  the  coast  of  Ireland  and  elsewhere  seaweeds  have  been 
dried  and  burned  and  iodine  and  potash  extracted  from  the  ash. 
This  process  cannot  pay  here.  A  ton  of  any  kind  of  fresh  sea- 
weed will  not  yield  more  than  150  lbs.  of  pure  ashes  and  14  lbs. 
of  potash.  The  ashes  would  contain  over  9  per  cent  of  potash. 
But  for  the  labor  of  gathering,  drying  and  burning  a  ton  of 
weeds,  the  income  would  be,  approximately,  14  lbs.  of  potash 
and  less  than  3  lbs.  of  phosphoric  acid,  which  are  worth  at 
present  $3.60. 


marine  mud.  ii 

Marine  Mud. 

This  is  mud  taken  from  flats  at  low  tide  or  cast  up  on  the 
shore  of  an  inlet.  If  it  is  put  in  heaps  above  the  highest  tides 
and  left  over  winter  to  drain  and  weather,  it  falls  to  a  fine 
powder,  but  if  heaped  in  summer  it  is  apt  to  bake  into  hard 
lumps. 

In  some  places  vast  quantities  of  small  shells,  ground  fine  by 
the  waves,  are  cast  up  with  the  mud.  Such  mud  may  contain 
3  or  4  per  cent  of  carbonate  of  lime,  which  increases  the  value 
of  the  mud. 

The  average  composition  of  nine  samples  from  various  places 
on  the  Connecticut  shore  analyzed  at  this  Station  and  calculated 
to  48  per  cent  of  moisture  (about  the  average  found)  was : 

Water    48.00 

*Organic  matter    3.95 

Mineral  matter    48.05 

100.00 

Of  the  48  per  cent  of  mineral  matter,  about  40  per  cent  is 
sand. 

The  four  samples  in  which  further  determinations  were  made 
contained : 

Potash    0.35% 

Soda    0.72 

Lime    0.43 

Magnesia    0.52 

Phosphoric   acid    trace 

Chlorine   0.93 

Sulphuric   acid   0.53 

Salt    (equivalent  to  the  chlorine 

and  soda;    about  1.5%) 

Though  the  percentages  of  organic  matter,  nitrogen  and  potash 
are  small,  applications  of  1,000  to  2,000  bushels  per  acre  have 
given  excellent  results,  due  in  part,  no  doubt,  to  the  action  of 
the  mud  as  an  amendment,  making  the  soil  more  retentive  of 
water,  and  perhaps  in  part  also  to  the  action  of  salt. 

It  will  not  pay  probably  to  haul  this  mud  far,  but  for  seashore 
farms  it  is  quite  worth  consideration. 


*  Containing  0.15  per  cent  of  nitrogen. 


12  CONNECTICUT    EXPERIMENT    STATION    BULLETIN    I94. 

Table  I : — The  Average  Composition  of  Seaweeds, 

OF  Marine  Mud  Calculated 


'Common  Seaweeds" 


6< 


Ribbon  weed,  Kelp,  Tangle^  

Broad  Ribbon  Weed,  Broad-leaved  Kelp' 

Round-stalked  Rock  Weed^   

Flat-stalked  Rock  Weed' 

Carrageen,  Irish  Moss^    

Eel-Grass,  Grass  Wrack*^ 

Dulse,   Dillusk'    

Less  Common  Seaweeds 

Phyllophosa  metnhrani  folia 

Cladostephus  verticellatus   

Polyides  rotundus    

Ahnfeldtia  plicata 

"Fine  Branching  Seaweed"  

Sea  Lettuce    

Coarse    Sponge    

Marine  Mud 


7 
II 
12 

9 
13 

I 


75-00 
75.00 
75-00 
75-00 
75-00 
75-00 
75-00 


75-00 
75-00 
75-00 
75-00 
75-00 
75-00 
75-00 


48.00 
48.00 
48.00 
48.00 
48.00 
48.00 
48.00 
48.00 
48.00 
48.00 
48.00 


(19.76)* 


(19-47) 
(19-34) 
(18.75) 
(10.90) 


5-49 
3.20 

4-34 
3-27 

28.80 
2.27 
2.86 
4-30 
5-35 
4-47 

11.26 


*  Most  figures  in  brackets  are  results  of  single  analysis  and  not  average. 

^  Laminaria  saccharina. 

^  Laminaria  digitata. 

^  Ascophyllum  nodosum. 

^  Fuciis  vesiculosus. 

°  Chondrus  crispus. 

®  Zostera  marina. 

''  Rhodymenia  palmata. 


ANALYSES    OF    MANURES    FROM    THE    SEA. 


13 


Calculated  to  75  Per  Cent  Moisture  and  Analyses 
TO  48  Per  Cent  of  Moisture. 


a  B 


(S-24) 


(5-53) 

(5.66) 

(6.25) 

(14.10) 


46.51 
48.80 
47-66 

48.73 
23.20 

49.73 
49.14 

47.70 
46.6s 
47-53 
40.74 


0.39 
0.45 
0.39 
0.43 
0.70 
0.41 
0.68 


0.80 

0.39 
0.82 
0.42 
0.98 

0.33 
1.04 


0.27 
0.25 
0.17 

0.79 
0.06 
0.09 
0.13 
0.19 
0.19 
0.53 


0.13 
0.12 
(0.02) 
0.12 
0.13 
0.15 
0.17 


O.II 

0.19 
0.15 
0.09 
0.24 
0.06 
0.25 


0.02 
tr. 
tr. 
0.69 
0.22 
0.04 
0.03 
0.05 

0.21 
0.42 


0.51 

0.62 

(0.45) 

0.79 
0.50 

(1.30) 
(1.36) 

1. 15 

0.42 
1.98 

0.53 

0.72 

1.23 
0.36 
0.88 

1.74 
0.48 

0.29 

0.40 
0.32 

0.42 
1.08 

0.34 
0.34 

0.53 
0.85 

0.23 

0.03 

0.83 

0.69 
0.49 
0.47 

0.91 

0.87 


3-66 
0.75 
0.60 
0.22 
0.31 

0.14 


0.38 
0.48 
0.86 
3-70 


0.67 


0.35 
0.38 
0.38 
0.30 

0.30 
0  16 


0.50 
0.31 
0.18 
0.28 
0.24 

0.2s 


0.38 
0.92 
0.05 
0.74 


(0.07) 

(0.02) 
(0.03) 

(0.21) 


3-83 

4-75 
5.88 

3-83 


University  of 
Connecticut 

Libraries 


39153029221746 


